The Sinatra Movie Some Blamed for JFK’s Death
In the 1950s, Frank Sinatra starred in Suddenly, a movie that happens to depict a plot against the President.
The Latent Racism of the Better Homes in America Program
How Better Homes in America—a collaboration between Herbert Hoover and the editor of a conservative women’s magazine—promoted idealized whiteness.
The Chemist Whose Work Was Stolen from Her
The Black scientist Alice Ball helped develop a treatment for leprosy in the early twentieth century. But someone else took the credit.
Were George Washington’s Teeth Taken from Enslaved People?
We know a surprising amount about the dental history of the nation’s first president.
What Do Pesticides and Chrysanthemums Have in Common?
They both contain insecticides called pyrethrins, used in ancient Persia. Today we use them in lice-killing shampoos.
Democracy, Beauty, and West Side Story
Well-researched stories from The New Yorker, Smithsonian Magazine, and other great publications that bridge the gap between news and scholarship.
Bipartisan Forever Wars
A critical analysis of both political parties is necessary to understand how the US has created its informal empire—and to envision a different future.
Are Galls Miracle Cures or Just Weird Growths on Plants?
For millennia, humans have exploited galls for medicine, fuel, food, tanning, and dyeing. Some people have considered them miraculous.
How Judi Bari Tried to Unite Loggers and Environmentalists
The radical environmentalist had a background in labor organizing and wanted to end the misogyny of the movement and the logging industry alike.
How Spirit Photography Made Heaven Literal
Are the departed watching over us, and if so, what are they wearing? Victorian spiritualists believed that ghosts could be captured on film.